478

S.

nay worse, a woman's fool

'Fool' is the stuff of which heaven makes a hero.

γου

SUETONIUS-BONDUCA

cannot 'scape our strength, you must yield, lady;

you must adore and fear the power of Rome. B. If Rome be earthly, why should any knee with bending adoration worship her?

479

480

She's vicious; and, your partial selves confess,
aspires the height of all impiety;

therefore 'tis fitter I should reverence

the thatched houses where the Britons dwell
in careless mirth; where the best household gods
see nought but chaste and simple purity.

'Tis not high power that makes a place divine,
nor that the men from gods derive their line;
but sacred thoughts, in holy bosoms stored,
make people noble, and the place adored.

TIME AND LOVE

J. FLETCHER

INCE brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless

SIN sea,

but sad mortality o'er-sways their power,

how with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
whose action is no stronger than a flower?
O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out
against the wreckful siege of battering days,
when rocks impregnable are not so stout,
nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays?
O, fearful meditation! where, alack!

shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?
or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back,
or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?

O! none, unless this miracle have might,

that in black ink my love may still shine bright.

PRIDE OF ANCESTRY

W. SHAKESPEARE

'T's Puild their glories at their fathers' cost;

IS poor and not becoming perfect gentry,

481

but, at their own expense of blood or virtue,
to raise them living monuments; our birth
is not our own act; honour upon trust
our ill deeds forfeit; and the wealthy sum,
purchased by others' fame or sweat, will be
our stain, for we inherit nothing truly
but what our actions make us worthy of.

Tw

THE END

G. CHAPMAN

die is landing on some silent shore,

where billows never break nor tempests roar:

ere well we feel the friendly stroke, 'tis o'er.

The wise through thought the insults of death defy, the fools through blessed insensibility.

'Tis what the guilty fear, the pious crave,

sought by the wretch, and vanquished by the brave; it eases lovers, sets the captive free,

and though a tyrant, offers liberty.

S. GARTH

482

CIRCUMSTANCE

483

WO children in two neighbour villages

playing mad pranks along the heathy leas;

two strangers meeting at a festival;

two lovers whispering by an orchard wall;
two lives bound fast in one with golden ease;
two graves grass-green beside a gray church-tower,
washed with still rains and daisy-blossomed ;
two children in one hamlet born and bred ;
so runs the round of life from hour to hour.

OUT when we joined battle

BUT

A. TENNYSON

fierce as a winter-storm upon the main,
I ranged the field, whilst my affrighted foes,
like billows at the angry Neptune's frown,
successively did vanish from my sight.
Did I not pour upon their foremost ranks,
sudden and fierce, as lightning; rush among
their thickest squadrons, and in glorious heat,
like thunder breaking from a teeming cloud,

484

make desolation wait upon my arms?

With my drawn sword I pointed out the path of dazzling fame, which none but I could tread, whilst all my army lagg'd, and you below

trembled, like girls, but to behold my daring.

D

EAD men and living, vows after vows sent up in hot succession to the throne of Heaven, deep ravage done amongst thy native fields, strange tortures suffered by thy countrymen, call thee with common voice to turn thy wrath to just account;-and is it come to this, that for the matter of but one day's feud with one tried friend that never did thee hurt, thou canst forget all else, and put thy cause to imminent hazard at the utmost verge of all its fortunes and its ultimate hope! if so, I cry thee mercy; I mistook thee; for I had counted on thy aid to-day

to do the things that thou so oft hast threatened.

H. TAYLOR

485

SONNET

486

OME glory in their birth, some in their skill,

some in their garments, though new-fangled ill;
some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse;
and every humour hath his adjunct pleasure,

wherein it finds a joy above the rest:
but these particulars are not my measure;
all these I better in one general best.
Thy love is better than high birth to me,
richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost,
of more delight than hawks or horses be:
and, having thee, of all men's pride I boast :
wretched in this alone, that thou mayest take
all this away and me most wretched make.

Y all is thine;

MY

W. SHAKESPEARE

one common hazard shall attend us both, and both be fortunate, or both be wretched.

487

488

But let thy fearful, doubting, heart be still;
the saints and angels have thee in their charge,
and all things shall be well. Think not, the good,
the gentle, deeds of mercy thou hast done,
shall die forgotten all; the poor, the pris'ner,
the fatherless, the friendless, and the widow,
who daily own the bounty of thy hand,

shall cry to heaven, and pull a blessing on thee.
Even man, the merciless insulter, man,
man, who rejoices in our sex's weakness,
shall pity thee, and with unwonted goodness
forget thy failings, and record thy praise.

T gives me wonder great as my content,

IT

to see you here before me. O, my soul's joy! if after every tempest come such calms,

may the winds blow, till they have wakened death;
and let the labouring bark climb hills of seas,
Olympus-high, and duck again as low

as hell's from heaven! if it were now to die,
'twere now to be most happy; for, I fear,
my soul hath her content so absolute,
that not another comfort like to this
succeeds an unknown fate.

GRATIANO-OTHELLO

HAT is the matter?

Gr. WHA

Oth.

Behold! I have a weapon;

a better never did itself sustain

upon a soldier's thigh: I have seen the day,
that, with this little arm and this good sword,
I have made my way through more impediments
than twenty times your stop: But, O vain boast!
who can control his fate? 'tis not so now.-
Be not afraid, though you do see me weapon'd;
here is my journey's end, here is my butt,
and very sea-mark of my utmost sail.
Do you go back dismayed? 'tis a lost fear;
man but a rush against Othello's breast,
and he retires;-where should Othello go?

W. SHAKESPEARE

489

scene,

OH! we must change these love were tasted;

the poor sleep little; we must learn to watch
our labours late and early every morning,
'midst winter frost sparingly clad and fed,
rise to our toils, and drudge away the day.
Want, worldly want, that hungry meagre fiend,
is at our heels, and chases us in view.

Can'st thou bear cold and hunger? Can these limbs,
fram'd for the tender offices of love,

endure the bitter gripes of smarting poverty!
When on a bed of straw we sink together,

and the bleak winds shall whistle round our heads,
wilt thou then talk to me thus?

thus hush my cares, and shelter me with love?

T. OTWAY

490 JOAN OF ARC TO THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY

491

OOK on thy country, look on fertile France,
and see the cities and the towns defaced

by wasting ruin of the cruel foe!

as looks the mother on her lovely babe,
when death doth close his tender dying eyes,
see, see the pining malady of France:

behold the wounds, the most unnatural wounds,
which thou thyself hast given her woful breast!
O, turn thy edgéd sword another way;

strike those that hurt, and hurt not those that help!
one drop of blood drawn from thy country's bosom,
should grieve thee more than streams of foreign gore;
return thee, therefore, with a flood of tears,
and wash away thy country's stainéd spots!

FOR

W. SHAKESPEARE

THE MISERIES OF CIVIL WAR

EUBULUS

OR lo, when once the dukes had offered grace
of pardon sweet, the multitude, misled

by traitorous fraud of their ungracious heads,
one sort that saw the dangerous success